Bloggings on Immigration Law

As ID announces in its October 20 issue, ICE has deported almost 400,000 people this year, almost half with no criminal violations at all, and the other half possibly including many people without any criminal records other than ones related to immigration. There can be no doubt that many of the people deported had US citizen or lawful permanent resident spouses, children, parents or other close family members. Many were also, without any doubt, productive, hard-working tax-paying members of society.

Many of those deported may also have had to endure intolerable and inhuman conditions in immigration jails which, as many have pointed out, seem to be run more for the private profit of well connected contractors than for the security or protection of the American people. Aside from the shame of turning away from being a Nation of Immigrants to becoming Deportation Nation, what are the implications of America's sharp turn to the right on immigration, where one presidential candidate is booed for suggesting that the country should "have a heart" toward immigrants and another is cheered for suggesting that they should be electrocuted?

No matter how bad any situation might become, there is always a tendency to assume that the worst has already happened. History shows again and again that this assumption is often false. The Obama administration's deportation mania, evidently unaffected by any palliative Morton memos, may lead inevitably to the next step - closing our borders completely. The main ingredient for this poisonous concoction, anti-immigrant racism, is already in place.

Two items in the October 18 ID show the extent to which immigration is being taken over by sheer insanity. One article reports that a small company in Washington State has been fined more than $170,000 as the result of an ICE investigation into I-9 irregularities. It appears that most, if not all, of the (admittedly numerous) I-9 violations were merely due to careless record-keeping, not any intent to evade the immigration laws.

There did not seem to have been any pattern of hiring unauthorized immigrants. This raises an interesting historical question: in Salem, Massachusetts, did they also fine the witches before burning them?

Another item in the same ID issue states that GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain (of the electrified fence wing) is meeting with Maricopa County, Arizona, Sheriff Joe Arpaio to discuss immigration, following a similar meeting between Arpaio and Michele Bachmann, who advocates passing Arizona style anti-immigrant hate laws in every state. According to the same item, Republican front runners Mitt Romney and Rick Perry (of the GOP's "have a heart" wing) have also made calls to Arpaio.

Among the many human rights violations which Arpaio has been accused of, one that stands out is his allegedly forcing immigration detainees to wear pink underwear. Pink was the color that gay inmates were forced to wear in Nazi concentration camps. Is this the person whom the Republicans are looking to as their kingmaker next year? One message from the GOP is coming across loud and clear: "If you are Latino, don't vote Republican."

In fact, if many Republican state legislatures have their way with strict voter ID requirements, Latinos and other minorities will not be able to vote at all. This raises the question why President Obama is also eager to drive away Latino voters. Insanity, thy name is immigration.

About The Author

Roger Algase is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School. He has been practicing business immigration law in New York City for more than 20 years

The opinions expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the opinion of ILW.COM.